DMV Official Candid About Department’s Difficulty With Robot Car Rules

Submitted by John Simpson on Tue, 10/13/2015 - 15:27

Self-driving car companies need to be more open with California about what they are doing, admitted a top California Department of Motor Vehicles official last week when describing the DMV’s struggle to craft regulations covering the deployment of robot cars on California’s highways.

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Brown Ends 2015 With a Whimper: the Good, the Bad and the Ugly

Submitted by Eddie Barrera on Mon, 10/12/2015 - 18:56

Landmark bills protecting digital privacy, greening energy use in the state, reining in health insurance abuses and expanding voter registration were among the good proposals signed by Gov. Jerry Brown as the 2015 legislative year drew to a close. Yet, in a year Californians called for bold, progressive action on gas prices, toxics regulation and ratepayer protection against back room dealings with regulated utilities, centrist saddling and tepid reforms dull the shine of those wins for the public. 

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Big Oil Gives CA Energy Commission and Californians The Finger

Submitted by Jamie Court on Mon, 10/12/2015 - 11:15
Governor Brown appointed the California Energy Commission (CEC) Petroleum Market Advisory (PMAC) to look into potential market manipulation by oil refiners in the state.
 
That's going to be hard to do now that the trade association for oil refiners, the Western States Petroleum Association, is telling the CEC and PMAC it won't participate in any discussions about supply disruptions or gas price spikes. In other words, FU.
 

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After Prompting, DMV Will Post Robot Car Crash Reports Online

Submitted by John Simpson on Fri, 10/09/2015 - 15:11

The Department of Motor Vehicles announced today that it will now post all robot car crash reports on its website and send out a news alert when a new one is added.

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Blue Shield's $1.2 Billion Promise to Tell the Truth

Submitted by Carmen Balber on Thu, 10/08/2015 - 17:34

If you believe state HMO regulators, they extracted some big concessions from Blue Shield this week in order to gain the Department of Managed Health Care’s approval to spend $1.2 billion it has stockpiled from customers after years of excessive rate increases. DMHC gave Blue Shield the go-ahead to buy Care 1st, a Medi-Cal health plan.

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Big Privacy Victory As Gov. Brown Signs CalECPA

Submitted by John Simpson on Thu, 10/08/2015 - 16:04

Californians won a major privacy victory today that catches protections up with modern technology.  Gov. Jerry Brown signed SB 178, the California Electronic Communications Privacy Act (CalECPA), into law.

It will require that law enforcement get a warrant before poking around in our digital records.  If the cops want to search your desk for letters and files, they need a warrant.  But who relies on paper files and letters these days?

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